Of Earth and Fire
by NeonFries
Summary: A few years after the war Johanna tries to put her life back together.


Johanna doesn't keep the baby.

It's been ten months, one week and four days since she moved to District 4 and Annie is barely keeping it together even with Johanna by her side 24/7. She doesn't need to be left alone, and besides, Johanna doesn't know what she'd do if they lost Mar, who looks so much like the last person she had any love for.

.

Gale is the only one who understands her fear of water.

"They don't have much water in District 12," he says in passing, still referring to his former district in the present tense. "I never learned to swim, and I don't know if I ever want to."

He doesn't mention the part where every day feels like drowning to him, every breath a plea for more oxygen than he can't take in because he killed her. Prim. Gale, in his vigor and long suppressed yearning for success, killed the one thing that kept him connected to Katniss, to his old world.

Without it (her) he's lost; spinning and confused, until Johanna finds him one day, pounding his fist into the walls of District 2's mountain office, leaving mismatched trails of blood in their wake and gravel in his knuckles, and shows him a different way to let out the rage and hurt he has been trying to pretend doesn't exist.

.

Things happen quickly at first. There's not much talking, just the tangling of bodies and heat and the comfort of sharing a bed with someone whose dreams are as troubled as your own. Probably, Johanna thinks, this is why Katniss does it, but she never mentions the idea to Gale.

Eventually, they begin to speak, to know each other through words instead of moans and scratches (Johanna has never looked so rough; bruised and scarred worse than she'd been the first time out of the arena, full body polish or no). They talk of politics, of Gale's show, of their old homes. Light stuff. But soon enough they run out of things to say, and while they were never officially a couple, the breakup happens a few months in, and afterwards, Johanna moves in with Annie and Mar. The threesome function like an odd family unit, and Johanna knows this is for the best.

.

The first time she vomits in the morning, she blames it on the alcohol Haymitch left in her apartment.

The second time it's the seafood. Nothing from District 4 is the same without Fin and his charms to ease the pain. Johanna wonders how Annie manages it, until she realizes this is all she knows. Never having been a mentor, Annie's only experience with the Capitol's delacasies were the days she was being prepared for the slaughter. Johanna wonders if Finnick loved this about Annie as much as she does. Yes, she knows, he did and then some.

The third time and Johanna is worrying. She was never one to worry before The War, but Johanna is not the same person now as she was before she was captured by the Capitol. They made very sure of that.

It takes another two bouts of morning sickness for her to finally buy the test, and when she sees the little pink plus sign her first response is to send Peeta a letter. She feels a certain kinship to him after all they've been through, and anyway she doesn't want to think about what this means right now.

.

This is a situation where 'it's not you, it's me' would be the right thing to say. But the baby can't hear her excuses, and even if it could it wouldn't matter. (She doesn't refer to it as a he or a she, that's far too personal for her liking. Though if it were a boy she'd name him Jack, a throwback to the nickname the people of her district once had).

.

In the month or so it takes for her to get Peeta's response, a solid bump has been growing between her thighs, and she has taken to wearing some of Annie's loose fitting shirts to cover it.

She hasn't even told Gale yet. It's less a question of should I, and more of does it matter? They aren't neither of them prepared to be parents. Johanna hasn't loved anything in a long time, and not even Mar, with his father's charm can make her believe that she will be able to love this baby born of anger and desperation.

Annie and Mar are at the shore, and Johanna decides to find them for support (she never needed anyone's support before but now she's afraid she'll fall apart before morning).

Standing on the pebbly shore with the wind whipping her face is so calming she almost decides she will tell Gale tomorrow over the phone and they'll decide together what to do. Just as she lets her mind wander to houses with polished wood floors and a burning coal stove, the walls tracked with tiny handprints, a wave crashes on to shore and the power pushes the water forward just enough to cover her bare feet and send her spluttering, running away from the second greatest enemy in her life.

That night she visits the abortion clinic. It is clean, sterile and most importantly, dry, and everything goes better than expected. Johanna doesn't even shed a tear and her figure is so slightly changed no one will know the difference.

.

The next morning the letter from Peeta finally arrives. In it she finds Peeta is just as good in writing as he is speaking, and she is even a little happy to hear that District 12 is being rebuilt and he and Katniss are finally able to just be in a way she, and Annie and Finnick and all the other victors were never able to.

It's on the last line though, the one where Peeta mentions a possible baby, that Johanna chokes, as if an Avox has just doused her with a bucket of cold water.

Johanna wonders which secret will hurt Gale worse; her's or Peeta's. She doesn't dare answer that question.


End file.
